


Putting It Back Together

by orphan_account



Category: Romeo And Juliet - All Media Types, Romeo And Juliet - Shakespeare
Genre: Gen, Humor, Tight Pants, slight hints of tycutio but thats just mercutio being himself
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-13
Updated: 2015-07-13
Packaged: 2018-04-09 03:53:25
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,788
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4332870
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bad things were not supposed to happen to Put-Together people. Tybalt Capulet was a Put-Together person.</p><p>Then again, when did anything good ever happen to Tybalt?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Putting It Back Together

This couldn't be happening.

Tybalt was never one to put his faith in much, but he’d always believed in one rule; bad things didn't happen to Put-Together People. The type of people who followed the same morning routine to a tee every day; the type of people who organized their bookshelves not alphabetically but chronologically; the type of people who on Sunday knew what clothes they were going to wear every day of the week. These were the caliber of people who had the world at their fingertips. They didn't make foolish mistakes; they didn't get distracted, they didn't get embarrassed. 

Tybalt Capulet was a Put-Together Person.

Which was why there was simply no way that this was happening to him.

To any casual observer, the position he was in leaning against the bathroom stall would have looked awkward at best, if not painful; though Tybalt probably wouldn't have let them survive long enough to examine the scene closer, they may have realized just how dire the situation at hand was. If the teenager's stiff and awkward pose, in which he stood as stubbornly as a statue, didn't give him away, the desperation gleaming in his eyes or evident in the way his hands were pressed against the painted red stall would.

Of course it would have to happen in the middle of a crowded mall, while he was alone; and a pack of rowdy Montagues undoubtedly looking for a fight would have to pass by right at that moment. Tybalt supposed he was only lucky he's been so close to a bathroom when the catastrophe occurred. Still, to his utter vexation, the Montague gang was still loud just outside the door... and at the present moment, as long as he wanted to avoid abject humiliation, Tybalt was stuck right where he was.

It wasn’t even as if no one had warned him- _“don’t wear those leather pants today, Tybalt, those are too tight, Tybalt, wear another pair.”_ In fact, Juliet’s nurse had told him almost those exact words just that morning; but Tybalt, in all his characteristic Capulet stubbornness, hadn’t listened. He supposed, then, that he’d had this coming from the very beginning.

That still didn’t mean he wasn’t completely humiliated about ripping his pants in the middle of the mall. Because it was humiliating. Oh yes, it was incredibly humiliating indeed.

He leaned back heavily against the stall, mind racing for anyway out of the precarious situation he'd found himself in. He was still in a state of disbelief; harshly, he snapped himself out of it and scolded himself for reacting so foolishly. He couldn't be shocked right now, he needed to think; what options did he have? He didn't have a spare pair of pants and the rip was obvious enough that he couldn't possibly venture out into the mall looking like this. He needed something to hide himself; he glanced down at his leather jacket, heavy on his shoulders. He didn't have anything else, so it would have to do. He could tie it around his waist, and could then very inconspicuously-

The door swung open.

Tybalt's attention jerked up suddenly, and the scowl that darkened his face was instantaneous. In that doorway stood the absolute last person he wanted to see that day, especially in his current situation.

The nephew of Verona’s prince and ruler blinked at him. Tybalt blinked back.

"Well, if it isn't the very Prince Charming whose arms I'd been hoping to fall into tonight!" Mercutio fell into a false fawn, taking one large step towards the Capulet; immediately tensing up, it dawned on Tybalt for the first time that with Mercutio blocking the door, the only escape he could take advantage of if needed was to go inside of the stall. “Come to escort me from my tower?” In absence of any weapons and obviously not fit to fight, he settled for glowering darkly at the other boy. Predictably, the same stupid jeer remained on Mercutio's face. 

"What's the matter? Bite off your own tongue?" He reached out and tapped his nose, and Tybalt contemplated biting _him._

"Mercutio. If I felt like fighting today you'd be on the ground already. Bleeding. You and your pack of dogs get lost and leave me alone."

Mercutio tilted his head, and Tybalt felt the urge to slap the mocking grin right off his face. “Ohh, feeling frisky today, are we?”

“Why don’t you just leave?” Tybalt snarled, lashing out and making a swing at the other boy. Mercutio easily danced out of the way; when Tybalt didn’t step towards him, it didn’t escape the other boy how the blond’s eyes narrowed slightly.

“Come on Tybalt. Can’t you keep up?”

“I’m not in the mood right now, I already told you. Why don’t you just go away?”

Tybalt crossed his arms, very pointedly looking away from Mercutio; but the impetuous royal wouldn’t be cast aside as easily as that. “Okay,” he sighed loudly; and with Tybalt trapped against the stall, he took the opportunity to side up to him, placing both hands on the side of his head. Tybalt’s entire body tensed; all of a sudden Mercutio was very close. Turning his head, he abruptly found himself face to face with Mercutio’s startling golden eyes. “What are you in the mood for?” the other teen purred, his groin very pointedly pressing up against Tybalt’s. The Capulet’s heartbeat doubled; this was the last straw.

With a grunt, he lunged out and hurled the other boy away from him. “Stop suggesting we have homo-erotic tension!”

“There’s the old Cat-O’-Nine I know and hate!” Mercutio seemed energized by the reaction he’d garnered; but Tybalt was suddenly very tense. He was all too aware that his movement had just made the situation ten times worse; the tear in the back of his pants had now certainly doubled in size.

His sudden shock didn’t escape Mercutio either, who gave him a baffled look. “What?”

Wordlessly, Tybalt shook his head, carefully backing up against the stall; squeezing his eyes shut, he wished fervently that at that moment he could be anywhere but there.

“Come on,” Mercutio persisted. “I thought we were having fun. What’d you do, burn out your last brain cell?”

“Don’t talk about yourself that way,” Tybalt retorted automatically, his voice terse; oh, was he ever screwed. And what made the situation even worse was Mercutio’s apparent inability to shut up.

“Well, what is it, then? Come on, here you are dressed in leather and lurking in a bathroom, and suddenly you don’t want to fight me? That’s just mean! Unless this is your way of telling me you actually want to take me up on my offer from earlier-”

The prince’s nephew’s voice suddenly broke off; Tybalt looked up sharply, and was alarmed both by the silence and the sudden look of comprehension on Mercutio’s face. “Oh,” was all he said, leaning back on his heels and crossing his arms in front of him. He took in the sight before him; a tense Tybalt, very carefully keeping his back covered and wearing extremely tight leather pants. _“Oh.”_

Mercutio immediately fell into a laughing fit. Tybalt was certain he’d never wanted to hit anyone more in his life.

“Shut up!”

“I’m sorry… I really… _am…_ it’s just… your fashion preferences, it seems, have left you stuck up a tree!”

Tybalt snarled, running his hands down the thighs of his pants self-consciously. These were good pants. They were fashionable. Mercutio could eat them, but that would be a waste of leather. “If you’ve had your fun, go find a cliff to jump off of and leave me alone now.”

Mercutio seemed almost surprised by the suggestion; he sobered instantly, raising an eyebrow. “Well, I never said I wasn’t going to help you, did I?”

If any words had ever shot a genuine jolt of cold fear down Tybalt’s spine, this was it; the Capulet eyed the other boy warily. “How,” he demanded, “can you possibly help me?”

Mercutio grinned wickedly. “Oh, I’ve got a few ideas…”

xXx

Tybalt had never hurried home so fast in his life. He was pretty sure his face was burning red as a tomato; even in the solitude of his car, speeding back to the Capulet mansion. He had never felt more self-conscious in his life. By the time he finally pulled in the massive garage and scrambled out, all he could think was that he couldn’t have gotten home soon enough.

Of course, luck was just not on his side that day, so Juliet was there to greet him almost as soon as he’d slipped inside the mansion. His fourteen year old cousin was leaning against the hallway wall, lighting up with eagerness when she finally saw her cousin. “You’re back! Did you get me-” Suddenly halting in her tracks, she stopped abruptly; her face took on an expression of bafflement. “What on _earth_ are you wearing?”

Tybalt sighed; glancing down at himself, the pair of skinny jeans that now clung to his legs looked horribly out of place on his lanky figure and altogether awkward. His face burned. “I… don’t want to talk about it,” the young Capulet muttered, brushing past his cousin and briskly making his way towards his room.

xXx

Mercutio had never had any shame, Benvolio thought, but this really was ridiculous.

“What on earth are you _wearing?_ ” ejected Romeo as soon as their blond friend emerged from the bathroom; Mercutio, proud as ever and utterly lacking any sort of diffidence whatsoever, placed his hands on his hips and proudly thrust forward, revealing… all too much. _Way_ too much.

“You like it, boys?”

“Mercutio,” Benvolio began slowly, “those pants have a tear in them…”

“Yes they do.”

“And you’re wearing them,” he continued, his vision going a little blurry around the edges, “backwards…”

“Yes I am.”

“So that you are particularly exposed in a particular area…”

“Yes,” Mercutio grinned. “I am. What’s the matter, Ben? Does this get you hot and bothered?”

The Montague nephew was quick to recoil, his face shifting into one of abashed horror. “N-no! What are you- I never- I don’t-” Desperately scrambling for enough words to form an adequate denial, after a few seconds poor Benvolio turned to his cousin with a helpless look. “R- _Romeo…_ ”

Romeo sighed, stepping forward and smacking Mercutio on the back of the head. “Put some pants on, dummy,” he ordered tersely, before looking up and flashing his friend a wry grin. “Besides- leather isn’t for you, anyway.”

“Agree to disagree,” Mercutio shrugged. “But yeah…” Examining himself carefully, he slowly nodded his head before looking back up at his friends. “I think it’s more Tybalt’s style than mine.”


End file.
